Off the Map
by Combustspontaneously
Summary: Annabeth Chase is a ghost. The only one who's looking for her is the one person she'd rather die than see, and the longer she stays in one place the closer he gets to finding her. So when she meets the funny boy running a restaurant that's in as much need of saving as she is, every instinct tells her to hit the road and forget his green eyes and quick wit. But she can't.


_Run, run, run._

The streets in front of her were bare, cracked asphalt half-obscured by red dust and dirt. The wind tickled her scalp through the open window, her arm resting, half out the car, on the sill. A pair of fuzzy dice wobbled on the mirror, and the car thrummed with old age as she sped down the dirt road. Annabeth eyed herself in the mirror. Less than forty-eight hours and she already looked like a different person. Blonde hair tumbled down her bare shoulders instead of the usual tight bun and her face, for the first time in months, was free of makeup. A zit was forming on her chin. She tugged on the purple strap of her tank top self-consciously, and tried to remember the last time she had dressed so casually in public.

Shaking her head and snapping her eyes back to the road, she made out a little blue 'welcome!' sign on the horizon. As she drew closer she could make out the words, printed in faded, swirly cursive.

"Welcome to Halfblood, Nevada," she read under her breath. "Home of the World's Best Strawberries."

Well, it seemed like a good enough place to stop for the night.

-x-

From what Annabeth could tell, it wasn't a very big town at all. Kind of one of those, 'if you blink, you'll miss it!' type of places. It was only six in the evening but it seemed no one was out on the dimly lit streets, save a few elderly looking types out walking their dogs.

It was perfect.

Annabeth drove slowly, keeping her eye out for any inns or motels, and it was only until she hit the town square that she saw one, nearly missing it. She parked right in front of the lobby (there were only two other cars there), grabbing her bag from her passenger seat. The sign out on the road had simply just said 'Hotel', but written in beautiful cursive above the main doors was 'The Lotus Hotel'.

"Hello?" she called, stepping into the lobby. Something sweet and old-sounding was playing overhead, crackling on the PA. The lobby was nicely decorated, although in a bit of a vintage-esque style. Annabeth glanced to a postcard stand to her right, showing beautiful red-streaked canyons and other various landmarks known to Nevada. All the postcards seemed faded and dusty, as if they'd been there forever. She wondered if they were designed to look like that. The stand squeaked as it spun.

Annabeth startled as she heard the floorboards squeaking behind him. Her heart thrashing in her chest (she had seen too many horror films not to be suspicious of creaking floorboards in abandoned hotels) she spun around, clutching the postcard she'd been looking at to her chest.

The man behind the desk looked at her amusedly. He was old, but kindly looking, with smile wrinkles around his eyes. "Would you like one, dear?"

Annabeth blinked at him, opening her mouth but seeming unable to make any noise. "Oh, um," she said, staring dumbly down at it in her hands. She had picked it up by random. It was a picture of an old-fashioned diner, _Sally's. _There was a beautiful woman with black hair standing in front of it, beaming proudly. "Yeah – I suppose so. " She put it down on to the counter and began ruffling through her backpack's pockets for spare coins. She finally managed to procure a few quarters and held them out to the man. He smiled and tugged at his brown beard.

"Keep it," the man said after a second, tilting his head.

She stared at him. "Really?"

"Why not? Consider it a great gift. Postcards go quickly around here," he said, glancing at the forlorn, droopy looking stand, absolutely stocked with them.

She took a second to understand his joke, and managed to crack a smile. The first in a while.

"Thank you," she glanced down at the breast of his pocket. There was a shiny little nametag there. "Chiron." He smiled again, a kind, genuine smile. "I don't suppose you have open rooms available?"

After Annabeth paid for her room, Chiron called out for his colleague to come take her bags (her backpack and one black suitcase she had to go get out of her trunk) up to the room. Mr. D was a short, stodgy sort of man, with thick, greasy black hair and a red nose. While Chiron looked the epitome of a concierge in his smart vest and finely pressed white shirt, Mr. D seemed to prefer awful purple Hawaiian shirts. Grumbling and throwing dirty looks all the way up, he lead her to a room on the top floor, with a beautiful big balcony. "Wow," she breathed. The door slammed behind her, and she moved into the room. It was obviously a lot nicer than what she had paid for, but she took it the hotel didn't have many visitors.

She shrugged her backpack onto the floor and walked towards the bed, flopping down on it. For the last two days, she'd been on the road. It was exhausting to say the least. Her neck cracked and creaked in unnatural ways as she stretched, in a way that reminded her painstakingly of her law school days. She had originally wanted to go into architecture but… well, it didn't work out.

Her stomach growled stubbornly. After living off of chips and gas station slushies for two days after a life time of five course meals – well, it wasn't too happy.

After she headed downstairs, she found Chiron sitting in front of the fireplace with Mr.D.

"Honestly, I don't understand how we even keep afloat," Mr.D grumbled. Their backs were turned to her, sitting in high-backed arm chairs.

"It must be your cheery disposition," Chiron drawled humorously.

"Oh, go take that tea cup right there and shove it up your – oh. Annabelle's back."

"Annabeth," she corrected pointedly. He rolled his eyes and turned back to the fire. Despite how viciously the sun beat down in the morning, as soon as the sky began to show the inky streaks of nightfall, the air began to chill. She sighed and turned back to Chiron. "Sorry for interrupting. I was wondering where I should go for a bite to eat around here."

Chiron set his tea cup down and bustled over behind the counter, procuring a map of the town. It wasn't as small as she had been expecting, though still far smaller than any place she was used to. It consisted mainly of a small center, with the town square, the hotel, and a few shops and boutiques, and bled out into little clots of trailer parks and neighborhoods that seemed to drift out into the desert. There were a few things just randomly placed around the town center as well, like a few schools and a clinic. He got out a blue pen and circled a little place rather out of the way. "This is the diner you see on that postcard," he said, tapping his pen on the circle. It splattered tiny specks of blue ink onto the paper, but he hardly seemed to notice.

"Oh, great," she said, reaching for the map.

He caught her hand just as she reached it though, looking solemnly into her eyes. "I'm afraid it's not quite what it used to be. The original owner, the woman you saw in that picture… she's gone now. Cancer. Ovarian."

"Oh," she said. She remembered the woman and her beaming grin on the postcard she left upstairs. She worried her lip, not knowing quite what to say. It seemed like Chiron knew her quite well, though she supposed that in a town as small as this, it was difficult _not _to know everyone.

"Her son runs it now," he smiled at her, though it didn't reach his eyes, which seemed to grasp at her very soul. "I think you'll find him to your liking."

She managed a smile, though it felt forced, her heart a little jittery in her chest.

She took the map and thanked him, heading out the door. Glancing down at the map underneath the porch lights, it didn't seem so far away, and with the weather taking such a nice turn, she decided to walk. She was tired of driving anyway.

She passed by her little yellow bug on the way, patting the hood with her free hand. Her messy curly blonde hair had been put up in a pony tail at the nape of her neck, and tickled at her shoulders. With her tight tank and cargo pants, strolling abandoned looking streets, she couldn't help but feel Laura Croft-ish. Like a female Indiana Jones.

The Sally's sign was flickering, the red glow casting over her bronzed skin, and she stepped in gratefully, a chill running over her bare skin.

"Hello?" she called. A juke box was playing something upbeat and playful in the corner (who has a juke box?), and it appeared no one was there. It was odd – sure, it was only a Tuesday, but at six o'clock? Where was the dinner rush? A man stepped out from the kitchen door, grinning at her.

"Hello."

The greenest eyes she'd ever seen.

_A/N: I know, I know, I should be working on Retrouvailles. I couldn't help but start this story though, considering I've been wanting to write it forever._

_I hoped you enjoyed it (:_

_Next chapter coming soon. Hopefully._

_Anna x._

Reviews are mucho appreciated.


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